


Carefully Everywhere Descending

by Ladycat



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Episode: The Siege, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-11
Updated: 2014-02-11
Packaged: 2018-01-12 00:18:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1179653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladycat/pseuds/Ladycat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There was always more and more to do, always something hovering in his mind, filling it, his mouth, until he breathed just to come up with new ways of thinking, of doing things.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Carefully Everywhere Descending

Homework became the escape. Instead of dreading it like all children everywhere, it became the talisman, the shield, the ultimate get-out-free card, a trump more powerful than any of his Tower's. Once he discovered _homework_ , he had the ultimate excuse. It never mattered what the homework was, he soon found out, his excited explanations of newer and harder problems, or a precise created specifically for him by a teacher aware of how insanely bored he was with the fractions the rest of her fifth grade class struggled with. The point wasn't what he was doing, not really. They never cared about that. But oh, to take a child away from their _homework_ , that mythical thing all parents needed to encourage, especially with geniuses -- that was unacceptable. That smacked his parents right in their image-conscious souls.

Although why an eight year old taking his six year old sister to the doctor, on the bus, arriving home well after dark, was less an issue than disturbing Rodney from his precious homework, he'd never understood. After awhile, he stopped trying. It wasn't worth the headaches it gave him, or the big, glittering tears that would gather in Jeannie's eyes -- after all, she was too young to have _homework_ to do.

As the years went by, Rodney had more and more homework to do, more achievements he tucked away under the bed, to be brought out when the lights went dim and the house breathed in quiet. Only then could Rodney examine each award and placard, close-cut nails skimming over gold-embossed seals or his name in calligrapher's ink. He never showed them to anyone at home, instead lording them over the heads of the progressively smaller classes he was thrust into, surrounded less by the jocks and morons who had trouble with _basic multiplication_ , and instead the ones who'd egged him on to create that model nuke, like he couldn't actually do it. Like he _wouldn't_ , because there was something holding him back. Someone.

Once Jeannie grew up enough that he no longer had to cook her meals, no longer had to make sure she bathed at least once a week, Rodney lived only for learning. He hid in the library as much as possible, pestering everyone he could find for more and more work, because so long as he had homework -- no longer school assigned, by this point, but that was irrelevant -- then he was free. He had no other obligations. He could just be _Rodney_ , and not the oldest McKay, responsible for a family his parents had never taught him to appreciate.

It didn't stop once he reached college, either. Then it wasn't family that drove him, but peers a minimum of four years and a lifetime of puberty and experience older than he was. He had nothing in common with any of them, and once again _homework_ became his escape. He clearly couldn't go to that party, even if he'd been invited; no time for that rally everyone was talking about, the one promising to be Woodstock revisited -- he had lab sims to run, and a paper to revise. More awards to accrue, the only real evidence of his flight and his hallowed destination.

Eventually, the 'home' moniker disappeared and it was simply _work_ he had to do. Dating was kept to a bare minimum, his apartment near barren except for solitary diversions. Somewhere along the line he'd convinced himself that he didn't want anything _but_ this life of constant motion, words and numbers streaming through his mind like the green-black matrix, never stopping even when Rodney closed exhausted eyes. Boston, New York, Berkley. Cheyenne Mountain, Siberia. Antarctica. Atlantis. There was always more and more to do, always something hovering in his mind, filling it, his mouth, until he breathed just to come up with new ways of thinking, of doing things. New _homework_ to pursue.

Then the _Daedalus_ computers refused to acknowledge his login. All his notes, his research, carefully packed away for anticipated boredom of the long trip back to earth, were missing from his quarters. There wasn't even a _notebook_ for him to scribble in, and repeated entreaties at the ship-board equivalent of a canteen yielded nothing but an extremely painful tension headache.

When he flat-out stole some paper from one of the lieutenant's -- dear god, she was writing a _romance story_ , how ridiculous -- said lieutenant snatched the papers right back and radioed for Sheppard.

Rodney just stared at her. "Are you brain damaged? I need to work! I have very important things -- life-saving research -- to work on, equations that will one day probably be necessary to save _you_ , since you're currently in a ship that works solely on the Asgard's good will, and who knows how long that will last? Just give me the damned paper and I promise if we ever break down, I'll be the one to -- "

"Rodney." One word, just one, amused drawl curling around like some sarcastic -- completely false -- form of good will, and all the air vanished from the room. Sheppard didn't seem to notice Rodney's impending death by suffocation, just nodded at the lieutenant and slouched against the table. "You're scaring the kids, Rodney. You want to cut that out, maybe?"

" _You_ locked me out," he seethed, his mind click, click, clicking away despite how tight his chest was getting and how cold the room now seemed. "You ransacked my room. You ordered them to play keep away with the goddamned paper. Congratulations, Major. You've successfully proved yourself to be an even bigger annoyance then previously, a record I hadn't thought you'd even attempt to beat."

Sheppard's smile quirked at the corners. "I should get a gold star."

"I have _work_ to do, Major!" he shouted, heat like a haze around his cheeks and eyes.

"No, you don't."

Rodney knew he was flushed bright red, his vision going sparkly along the edges, breath rasping cold and thin in his throat. "Fine," he gritted. "Fine. I don't have work for Atlantis to do at the moment, you're right." Elizabeth had made certain that Radek allow Rodney only the 'recreational' research, which Rodney was frankly okay with. String-theory was soothing after staring at the mind-numbing equations the ZPM generated. "But I _still_ have work to do, Major."

_Can't do that, Mom, I've still got that history paper to write. Sorry, Dad, I'd love to help, but math is really tough this semester. Sorry, Trina, I know I missed our date, but there was this fascinating theory and I really needed to work on it to the end. Can't do it. Don't have to. I can stay here, away, protected and alone, because I've got_ homework _to finish._

"Come on."

Rodney blinked at the warm hand on his arm, clasping around his wrist -- which was shaking, he noted. Not Sheppard's hand, smooth and strong, but his own wrist. His entire body. Shivering and shaking like a rockslide and he was pretty sure things he needed were tumbling free from his mind, because he didn't remember the walk back to his quarters, just that suddenly they were there and Sheppard was pushing him inside. Onto his bed. Sitting next to him and saying things to him, like _I'm sorry_ and _relax_ and _dammit, you aren't even listening, are you?_

And suddenly there were arms around him, fingers flexing on his bicep as he was tugged and shifted, repositioned so that they were flat on the bed, Sheppard on his back, Rodney laying over him like some bizarre form of a Magic Fingers blanket, since he was still shaking, his mind still in fragmented pieces, reflecting light and nothing else as they lay glittering inside his skull.

_Sleep_ , something whispered to him, _just go to sleep_ , and without the power of his intellect to save him, Rodney shivered and shuddered his way into unconsciousness.

* * *

"For god's sake, Major, I have _work_ that needs to be done. Yes, it's not exactly vital work, but I would like to try and keep my name at least nominally in the field, which means papers, which means _me writing them._ "

"Didn't you sign something with the SGC that prevents you from publishing anything? Even if it doesn't have to do with the Stargate program?"

" ... "

Sheppard's grin was sharp enough to gleam. "I can do research too, Rodney. And the answer's still no."

* * * 

"Do you have a calculator on you?"

"No. And do you really need one, anyway?"

"You calculate pi this many decimal places, and yes, you do."

"I'm not afraid to hit you, Rodney, and I know how to do it without concussing you."

* * * 

"What about a book? Do you still have that Russian monstrosity with you?"

"Would you take notes?"

"Major!"

"No, Rodney, no books."

* * *

Restlessly pacing, Rodney had to forcibly stop running his hands through his hair, since the last thing it needed was to grow even thinner, or get yanked out inadvertently. Or even intentionally. "You can't keep me here! I'm not a prisoner!"

"Of course you're not a prisoner, Rodney. If you want to go somewhere, we can."

Sheppard _had_ to be as bored as he was, after two days of dealing with Rodney, leaving only to get them their meals, shoving Rodney flat against the cold metal walls as they shared the cramped bed at night. He had to be going stir crazy, ready to chew off his own fingers just for something to do. But he didn't look like he was bored, eyes dark and fathomless as they calmly met Rodney's, his body totally still the way Rodney had only seen soldiers used to actual combat achieve: that total, sudden relaxation, because the next moment might be a skirmish to the death.

"We could go running?" he suggested desperately. 

"You hate running."

" _I don't care!_ And, also, saying I hate it is not a no, so we're going running. Right now! We'll go the length of the ship and if we just happen to glance in on the engine rooms, that'd be great, because I thought I heard something weird a few hours ago -- like a high pitched scraping sound -- and I could just ask Novak if she thought maybe it was worth looking in to. But then we'd be running again! Run, run, running!"

Both eyebrows went up, making the mop of Sheppard's hair jerk backwards like even it was totally unbelieving. "Staring and watching other people work is still work. I know you, Rodney, you'll see something and just _have_ to point it out, and pretty soon they'll forget that I ordered everyone to stay away from you and you'll start _working_ again."

It should have been Sheppard flat-out admitting that he'd ordered everyone to help cage him that Rodney focused on. Instead, though, it was the way he'd said _working_ , like the word was coated in castor oil and the faster he spit it out, the sooner he wouldn't have to taste it. And he was staring at Rodney again, quietly assessing even as he slouched along Rodney's bed.

Rodney sat down on the edge, hard enough that the mattress shook. "But I have to," he said forlornly.

"No, you don't."

Heat bloomed along Rodney's shoulder, the sound of shifting, moving bodies melding into the blankness inside his mind. He really had stopped working on mental equations or theories sometime yesterday afternoon, because without a computer, without a piece of paper to scrawl on, he couldn't really say he was working. 

It wasn't really homework if you couldn't turn it in, was it?

The air around him felt too far away, each thudding heart beat echoing as the lack of something to distract himself with bloomed empty and hollow around him. "What am I supposed to do?" he asked, as plaintive as a child. "I have to have something to do."

Sheppard was holding him, again, pressing kisses Rodney barely noticed over his stubbled jaw, onto his mouth. "You don't have to do anything. It's okay to stop thinking."

But it wasn't, really it wasn't. Because if he stopped working, stopped _having_ work to do, then ... then...

Then he'd have nothing at all.

"You could talk to me," Sheppard told him. "Not about work, not about Atlantis. You could talk to me about ... okay, what's your favorite video game? And don't tell me you don't play 'em, Rodney, because I know you do."

He did, actually, and he found the answer settling on his tongue before he realized that that wasn't what he wanted to say. Pushing himself more upright -- Sheppard made a noise of disappointment and then, shrugging, just went with him -- he twisted around so he could really see. Sheppard blinked back at him, lifting his head from Rodney's shoulder and let him. "And if I asked you," Rodney said slowly, "what your favorite video game was -- or, or maybe who you liked playing them with the most -- would you tell me?"

This time, Sheppard's kiss wasn't distracting, wasn't something that made time blur. It was slow and steady, providing whole new sets of parameters Rodney could spend months -- years, forever -- trying to examine. "Sure," he said, the lazy summer drawl in his voice warming Rodney like the sun. "I'll tell you that."

"And, and other things, things like do you have any siblings, and what's your favorite flavor of ice cream, and if flying means the same thing to you that science means to me?"

"Not science," Sheppard corrected, which wasn't a denial, and couldn't be when his hands were smoothing over Rodney's skin, his body warm and solid and _there_ , unmoving. "Homework. If it's the same as homework, for you."

"Well?" Kissing Sheppard was like speaking with him never had been before, all the masks and disarming phrases stripped down to nothing. Rodney liked it, but he wanted his answer, first. "Will you? And how the hell did you know about the homework?"

Sheppard's laugh wasn't actually very nice, aurally, it was too rhythmic, like feet on stairs, not musical enough, but it was such a new sound that Rodney froze when he heard the first notes of it. "You talk in your sleep. And yeah. Homework for you, flying for me. Same thing."

"Is it?"

Another kiss, this time with teeth, and Sheppard's hands found their way underneath Rodney's waist band. "Yeah, it really is."


End file.
